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Ian Samuel’s research focuses on cybersecurity as well as the federal courts, particularly the Supreme Court. He is the author of The New Writs of Assistance, 86 FORD. L. REV. 2873 (2018), a caution about the government’s under-appreciated power to leverage the power of network service providers for surveillance; and Warrantless Location Tracking, 83 N.Y.U. L. REV. 1324 (2008), which argued that monitoring a person’s movements using her cell phone is a Fourth Amendment search. He is also the co-host of the popular Supreme Court podcast First Mondays, which covers the Court’s weekly business in an occasionally entertaining format. His popular writing has appeared in publications such as Slate, the Boston Globe, and Jewish Currents; he is also a frequent commentator about the Supreme Court’s business in the media.

Before entering the academy, Samuel was a law clerk for Justice Antonin Scalia on the Supreme Court of the United States, and Judge Alex Kozinski on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit. He also worked for three years in the Justice Department and for three years at Jones Day, specializing in appellate litigation. He has argued over a dozen cases in the federal courts of appeals, including United States v. Lavabit, 749 F.3d 276 (4th Cir. 2014), which concerned whether Edward Snowden’s email provider could be required to provide extraordinary assistance to the United States government.